Livestock
by vickrok
Summary: Of course she remembered. How could she not? **Written and completed before Season 4.**
1. Chapter 1

**This story was completed before Season 4 began. **

* * *

Chapter 1

**Mid-March**

The saving grace was that now, seven weeks later, it was as though it had never happened.

Maybe he was deluding himself, but he didn't think so. As far as he could figure, nothing had changed. Vic still showed up early and stayed late, immersed herself in every investigation, remained committed to the principles of the profession.

She still barked out his name as her boots knocked across the wooden floor, the energy of discovery buzzing around her like a force field. She still grabbed hold of him with her eyes, intense and unafraid, saying, "Check it out, Walt. This asshat has a history," or, "Twenty bucks says this genius knows more than he's letting on."

She'd hand him the report or the article or the photograph or whatever it was she'd uncovered, then she'd lean across the desk to point something out, so close he could smell her lotion, feel her heat.

She'd bite her bottom lip, and to his shame, his gaze would shift there without his consent. She never seemed to notice, though, and he convinced himself he was grateful for that.

Business went on as usual: She complained about traffic detail, argued with Ferg, objectified men, cussed excessively, and insulted witnesses. From time to time, late on a quiet evening, she'd even come timid and doe-eyed into his office to talk.

Then just as unexpectedly, she'd be gone, leaving him nothing new to wonder about.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late January**

_It was on a moonless late-January night that Warren Edwards was found floating face down in his half-frozen stock pond along with seven head of cattle._

_Walt awoke from a deep, blank slumber to the ringing. _

_The restless, often wakeful nights on the couch were past, and these days, the grief wafted in and out of the windows of his life, present but no longer disruptive. Sleep seemed to do with him as it pleased, to scatter the fragments of his consciousness like puzzle pieces across time so that always it took some retrieving and patching to return to the here and the now._

_His bare feet ached against the wood floor as he stood in the blue dark of the front room, taking the report from Aubrey Davis. _

_"__You sure he's dead, Aubrey?"_

_"__The man's frozen solid, Walt."_

_"__You just happened upon the scene at two in the morning?" _

_"__Them cows was bellowing up a storm. Couldn't get a wink of sleep over here. Reckoned there was a coyote out there."_

_"__Or a wolf," Walt said. "They're back."_

_"__Anything my bullet hits, I'm sayin' I thought it was a coyote."_

_"__So you walked out through four feet of snow to Edwards' place?"_

_"__Took the snow machine. Them cows sure ain't bellowin' now." His chuckle transitioned into a phlegmy cough._

_"__Just sit tight at home, Aubrey. We'll be by once we process the scene."_

_"__You bringin' that girl with you?"_

_"__Deputy Moretti isn't on call tonight."_

_"__That's too bad," Aubrey said._

_As soon as he hung up, Walt dialed Vic's cell—three rings, then voicemail. He forbade his mind from trying to explain it, but his mind never had been particularly cooperative._

_His second call didn't even ring, and the imaginings were more explicit. He didn't leave a message. _

_Five minutes later, while he was buttoning his jeans, she called back sounding out of breath. At two-thirty in the morning._

_"__Walt. What's wrong?" _

_His stomach fluttered at the sound of her voice. What a fool he was._

_"__We've got a body out at county line."_

_"__And?" She'd gone from genuine concern, worry even, to mild annoyance within the span of ten seconds._

_"__If you're busy," he said, "I can get hold of Ferg."_

_"__It is Ferg's night, so yeah, that seems right." He thought he heard laughter in the background. "Would have been even righter if you'd done it before dragging my ass out of bed."_

_A wave of nausea surged through him. _

_"__Walt?"_

_"__I'm here."_

_"__So call Ferg."_

_"__Your truck has the best heater," he said. "It's five below."_

_"__It's twelve. Above. I was just out there." _

_"__I thought your ass was in bed."_

_"__Did you just mention my ass?" She was flirting with him, and this time he'd started it._

_With one hand, he tugged at the waist of his jeans, which had been slipping down over his hips. _

_"__I'll make coffee."_

_"__What the fuck, Walt?"_

_"__So you'll pick me up?" he asked. "Since it's out this way?"_

_By three o'clock they were standing at the edge of the stock pond, Maglite beams bouncing off the ice into the frosty mist, inventorying the carnage. _

_Before they'd gotten out of the truck, she'd turned to him, right knee bent up against the center console, waiting for direction, and he'd gotten stuck. She was wearing her uniform with a multicolored beanie and matching scarf he hadn't seen before. In the dome light of the truck she'd looked so pure, her eyes and face glowing, her lashes so long. _

_"__What?" she said._

_He'd been here before, right in this exact spot with her deferring to him, handing it all over, expectant. _

_"__You're pretty," he mumbled._

_It wasn't a slip. _

_He had plenty of opportunity to stop it, and he chose not to. He chose, knowing it was a mistake, because as far as he was concerned it had already been decided, whether the rational side of him agreed to it or not. _

_Her eyes narrowed, and she tilted her head, only very slightly, and she said almost in a whisper, "What did you say?"_

_He drew in a sharp breath, shook his head, and got out of the truck. _

_For an hour and a half, they wrangled Edwards' corpse through the ice. She took one end of the forty foot rope, and he took the other, and she crunched around the icy bank to the other side of the pond, where he could see just her general dark shape and the clouds of warm white haze as she breathed. They pulled the rope taut and lowered it over the ice to drag the body towards the shore, taking turns calling out reminders not to fall in. Over and over the rope or the body got hung up on a stiff cow or a section of ice, and twice they decided to give up only to start again, first because of his brilliant solution, then because of hers. _

_Finally, close to five o'clock, as the east began to pale, they dragged the body up onto the shore. Ice covered the nostrils and the eyes, which were open wide. He held the light while she examined the body—no bullet holes, no sign of trauma. She unzipped the jacket, snapping off a sharp strip of ice in the process._

_"__Walt," she said, staring up at him. "Ligature marks?"_

_"__Kind of low, but could be." He crouched down next to her and moved the jacket further out of the way. "Might just be a wrinkle." In the artificial light it was hard to tell. "That's a nightshirt."_

_"__Pajama top," she said. "Nightshirt's like Ebenezer Scrooge."_

_"__So he wasn't planning on being out here."_

_"__Bellowing cows?"_

_"__Came out to investigate and found the cows had broken through the ice?" _

_He stood up and looked out across the pond at the lumps of frozen bovine._

_"__Doesn't scream foul play," she said._

_"__No. But it doesn't not scream it, either."_

_She stayed with the body while he drove out to the road with her phone to call the coroner. When he got back she was walking around in circles, hugging herself. As soon as he came to a stop, she ran over to the truck and got in the passenger seat. She was an ice cube chilling the cab._

_"__Here," he said, pulling the thermos out from behind the seat. "That cup's yours." _

_While he poured, she held the mug, shivering. He didn't ask her if she was okay because that would only piss her off, and besides, he knew she was. _

_For a long time, she was quiet, hands wrapped around the mug, staring out through the side window at the body they'd covered with a horse blanket. _

_"__You know what, Walt?" Her voice was soft, almost wistful, and it melted his heart a little._

_"__What?" _

_"__Fuck you."_


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

**Early February**

The case had gone cold.

If Walt was honest with himself, and sometimes he was, he could admit he'd handled it poorly. In the blissful, terrifying hours and days after, his mind had been snarled. Now that he was thinking more clearly, he could recognize all the junctions where he had taken all the wrong turns.

There had been some sort of backlog with the M.E., and as a result, the word _homicide_ wasn't used officially until ten days after they fished Warren Edwards out of the stock pond. By that time they'd exhausted all their leads.

That evening after everyone else had left for the day, Vic sat on the couch in his office, laptop on knees, reading through Doc Bloomfield's report and giving Walt the highlights.

"Light brown and dry ligature mark approximately one centimeter in width at the base of the neck."

"Asphyxiation?"

He leaned back in his chair, watching her in the low yellow light. The computer glowed lavender on her face as her eyes scanned back and forth across the screen.

She shook her head. "Post mortem. So we're dealing with someone who has a very limited understanding of forensic science."

"Or someone who panicked. Inflicted the injury unintentionally." He scratched the side of his head. "Not drowning either then, I guess."

"Nope. No water in the lungs."

He went over to her the same way he would have two weeks ago and sat down, not touching but close enough that he could feel her and smell her and see the perfect curve of her ear beneath an errant strand of blond hair. Already there was the crowding in the crotch of his jeans.

It would never again be two weeks ago; the understanding of that and the weight that accompanied it paralyzed him.

She, on the other hand, wasn't nervous or awkward or withdrawn, or anything one might expect under the circumstances. She just shifted her position a little so he could see the screen.

"Blunt force trauma on the back with some sort of metal or iron implement."

"That killed him?"

"This killed him." She turned the computer to face him and pointed. "Flunitrazepam. LD50, in addition to a blood alcohol level of point one five."

"Roofies?" he asked.

She shrugged. "He was down at the Red Pony and someone slipped him one hoping to get lucky?"

He didn't think she was trying to be funny, but he grinned.

"He was sixty-seven, Vic. With that in his system, a man half his age wouldn't be able to get it up."

He knew what he was doing. He'd hit a new low, baiting her, trying to get her to engage.

"I know," she said. "But none of it's logical."

She wasn't biting, and it scared him. He moved away from her slightly because he so desperately wanted to move closer.

She had the middle finger of her right hand on the mouse, scrolling down further through the report, her left hand resting just under the keyboard.

"Hey . . . uh." He cleared his throat even though he didn't really need to. "Do you think maybe we should talk about . . . you know?"

"What?" she asked without looking up, without really seeming to have registered what he'd said.

If she was playing him, she was doing an outstanding job.

At first the silence had made sense: They were both thrown, understandably overwhelmed, spooked even. But now it had morphed into something else that at best left him agitated and at worst, had him questioning his mental stability.

"What?" she asked again, this time dragging her eyes, expressionless, away from the screen and over to him.

"You want me to say it?"

"Say what?"

"Come on, Vic." He sounded about as distressed as he was beginning to feel.

"Come on what?"

She turned towards him, knee bent on the couch, a crinkle between her eyes.

"You know what I'm talking about," he said.

She stared at him for an uncomfortable moment.

"You seem upset," she said.

"Well maybe I am. I'm trying to talk to you."

She nodded. "I get it, Walt. It feels to you like we shared some sort of experience and now I'm acting oblivious."

"Yes," he said, relieved. "Exactly."

Her sympathy seemed genuine as she said, "That's frustrating."

Not two seconds later, she closed the laptop, stood up, and started towards the door. "I have to go."

He walked out with her into the main office, and a few minutes later, watched her close the door behind her and listened to her boots descending the steps.

The silence and stillness she left behind was eerie, as was the irrefutable knowledge that it was the choices he'd made at each one of those junctions that had landed him here.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late January**

_About the time the body was bagged and loaded, the northern pole of the sun peeked over the snowed-crusted roof of Aubrey Davis's barn. When it was a full orange disk in the pale sky, the cows started coming back over the rise, their hooves crunching the frozen slush. They seemed to stall out high on the bank with a view of the seven new cow-shaped islands in the pond, their mooing pensive and lonesome and penetrating. _

_Walt and Vic hadn't exchanged more than two words since her previous two words. The coroner had arrived shortly thereafter, and then they'd been out and moving again in the bitter cold. _

_One word had been, "Sorry," before the coroner got out of his truck, and before Walt had thought specifically about what he was apologizing for, which probably explained why the other word was, "Whatever."_

_Now she looked up at him, cheeks rosy from the cold, and said, "Who plowed and salted the road? It's private."_

_"__Edwards I'm assuming. No one else lived here with him. Or could be Davis. They shared the pond."_

_"__And the cows did this." She kicked at the frozen, chopped up soil with the toe of her boot._

_The terrain surrounding the pond was conspicuously void of snow. Though it hadn't actually snowed for a few days, in most places there was a four to five foot pack. _

_She walked out to the edge again where they had pulled the body out. _

_"__Tire tracks," she called over to him. "At least three, maybe four sets over there." She motioned with her head towards the truck. "Only one set here." _

_He came over and crouched down. _

_"__This'll be slush within the hour," he said._

_"__Unless the cows are too freaked out to come any closer."_

_"__They'll come," he said. "Let's get some pictures."_

_She removed her right glove and with her phone got shots from various angles. When she was done, they got back in the truck and drove over to Davis's farm using the private road connecting the ranches. It had been cleared all the way through._

_Cows dotted the sparkling white expanse, all the way to the hills at the far edge of the property. It was a beautiful morning, but she looked exhausted, dark half circles under bloodshot eyes. _

_For the first time he felt sincere remorse._

_"__Next time Ferg's on call, I'll call Ferg," he offered because saying, I can't stand being without you, was along the lines of telling her she's pretty, and that hadn't gone over too well._

_"__That's so generous of you." Even her sarcasm was anemic._

_Her right hand was on the wheel the way his always was, right arm stretched out as a barrier between them. She was closing herself off the way he closed himself off, but it was different being the passenger, the one kept at a distance._

_"__You know it's only because you're such a competent deputy," he said because he couldn't say, I want to feel your body against mine._

_"__You're so full of shit, Walt." There was a vibrating trace of anger in her voice. _

_His witching hour phone call had been the tipping point for her, and now he was standing downhill. _

_"__I know I am," he said, his stomach muscles tightening, bracing for a blow._

_She pulled into the Davis's dooryard, cut the engine, and turned on him. "It's most definitely not because I'm a competent deputy. So how about next time you decide to hit on me, you follow through."_

_Was that what she wanted? For him to follow through?_

_He turned to look out the window, towards some decrepit outbuildings, buying himself a little time. _

_When he had it under control, he turned back to her and said, "Deal."_


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

**Late January**

_Aubrey Davis was similar in size and appearance to a garden gnome, but what he lacked in physical presence, he made up for in motive and opportunity._

_He invited Walt and Vic into the cramped, kitschy parlor at the front of the house, offering them coffee and the two-seater sofa that in some circles might be referred to as a love seat. They declined both._

_"This won't take long, Aubrey," Walt said._

_"Well, I sure am glad that cheap old bastard's dead," Aubrey volunteered as though this were just some sociopathic but neighborly Sunday afternoon visit, as though he wasn't entirely clear on the significance of having the Sheriff and a deputy as his guests. "Exceptin' he owed me three thousand dollars."_

_"Estate should pay his debts," Walt said, a bead of sweat sliding down his cheekbone from his hairline. It had to be at least eighty degrees in there, not to mention stuffy with thirty years of tobacco smoke and yesterday's bacon._

_"Aw, there ain't nothing left, Sheriff."_

_Vic's arms were crossed, hip stuck out one way and head tilted the other. Her brown eyes browsed the room, seeming to pick up each item individually and examine it. There was a distinct frog motif._

_Without interrupting her survey, she said, "So I'm taking it you didn't get along." _

_"Tell you what, missy," Aubrey said, massaging his nicotine yellowed beard with his nicotine browned fingers. "There shoulda been someone there to drown him every day of his life."_

_"Wow," Vic said, looking directly at him. "Okay."_

_She unzipped her jacket, a pink, moist flush on her cheeks. Walt thought he'd like to be the one causing that flush, then he immediately felt some sort of throwback, middle aged guilt for thinking it._

_"You know this is serious, Aubrey," he said._

_"Now don't go gettin' your shorts in a wad, Walt." He seemed proud of himself for addressing the Sheriff in that manner, though Walt hadn't reacted one way or the other. "Warren didn't wanna farm no more. That man was here outta spite, pure and simple."_

_"Spite towards you?" Walt asked._

_"T'wards the damn corp'rations buying up all this land."_

_"Someone was trying to buy you two out?" Vic asked, scrutinizing him now the way she'd examined the knick-knacks._

_"Sawyer Assets. Them bastards already own three hundred thousand acres on the Cumberland side."_

_"But Edwards didn't want to sell?" Walt asked._

_"No one wants to sell. You know that well as anybody. Ain't no place else to go."_

_"Mrs. Edwards went, though, didn't she?" Walt asked._

_"That ain't the same as sellin' out. She went off to California to be with her kids and grandkids."_

_"Any idea where?" Vic asked._

_"Sacramenta maybe."_

_"They were divorced?" _

_"Could be."_

_Walt shook Aubrey's rough little hand. "Appreciate your time, Aubrey. We may be back with more questions. You make sure we can find you."_

_The air outside, though still barely above freezing, was a relief. Walt removed his coat and hat and dropped them behind the seat while Vic did the same. He purposely didn't watch, looked out instead towards the functional farm buildings. __What appeared to be an even tinier gnome was walking quickly up towards the house from the barn._

_"Who's this guy?" he said._

_Vic shrugged, watching. "I don't think it's a guy."_

_Behind them, the screen door slammed, and Aubrey was speed walking across the front yard. _

_"One more thing, Sheriff," he said, breathing hard. "That man stole my wife."_

_"Mr. Davis," Vic said, raising her eyebrows, somehow calling him a crazy ass motherfucker without actually saying it. "You understand that we're not building a case against Mr. Edwards. We're trying to figure out who, if anyone, killed him."_

_"I ain't dumb, Deputy," he said, but he didn't seem offended. He was just letting her know._

_"Anything you say can be used against you in court."_

_"Am I a suspect?" he asked. "This an inter'gation?"_

_The hair at Walt's temples was wet with sweat, and the cold breeze gave him a chill. _

_"Aubrey," he said letting out a punctuated breath, "you came out here to talk to us."_

_When Walt returned his attention to the farmyard between the barn and the house, the little man was gone._

_"Mr. Davis," Vic said, "someone was walking up from the barn."_

_"Only other person out here's my wife."_

_"So you remarried?"_

_"No, it's the same one."_

_Her jaw clenched. "Didn't you just tell us that Edwards stole your wife?"_

_"Well, he returned her eventually."_

_In the truck, pulling out onto the county road, her left hand on the wheel, Vic squinted against the glare of the morning sun in the mirrors and shook her head. _

_"Well, at least now we know he didn't collect all those frogs on his own," Walt said._

_She smiled at him, and the sight of it loosened whatever had been squeezing his chest all morning._

_"Those were some seriously fugly frogs," she said. "We could arrest him for that alone."_

_Now he smiled, too, so that it was something they were doing together, but they were playing it cool, too, pretending to focus outwards, away from each other, through the windshield and out onto the pavement, wet and shining from the snowbanks on either shoulder melting in the stark winter sunshine. _

_He wanted to stop it all right here in this moment. He wanted to build a box around it, keep it contained because these days it was more elusive than it had ever been, and he wanted to hold onto it. _

_During that first year or even two, before all the truths had been laid bare, they had been like this, happy, in concert, flirting even, daily. Then it all changed, a tile at a time until one day it had become an entirely different picture._

_"Think he did it?" _

_"Probably not," he said. "But he sure wanted to get arrested for it."_

_She laughed. "Yeah, no shit."_

_"We need to question the wife. And track down the other one."_

_"I'll get on it."_

_"No," he said, "you go home. You haven't slept."_

_He was hoping she'd elaborate on her lack of sleep, ease his mind, but she only nodded._

_"Is your friend still—" he started._

_"What friend?" she snapped, immediately defensive, glancing quickly at him then back at the road._

_He ran his palm down his thigh to his knee, and without looking up he said, "You were on a, uh—"_

_"A date?" she said, the irritation back so soon._

_He waited, her eyes burning a hole in the side of his face._

_"You thought I had someone over?"_

_"Yeah," he said. "I mean that's okay, I just thought—"_

_"And you still insisted on me coming out here with you?" She was raising her voice, agitated. _

_He had an answer, just not one he could reasonably share._

_"And by the way, Walt, hell yes it's okay."_

_"I didn't mean it that way." He'd purposely lowered his own volume, trying to bring the whole thing back down a level or two._

_But then it kept on dropping, all the way into silent and tense. Her right hand was back on the wheel when she pulled up in front of the cabin._

_When he got out of the truck, he lingered in the doorway waiting for her to look at him, but she didn't. Her jaw clenched again._

_Finally he just said, "Thanks, Vic," and he closed the door._

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late February**

At first he wasn't sure what he was looking at. That's how often anyone used vacation time around this place. When he'd taken days back in July, Ruby had filled out the paper work for him.

Now she stood patiently watching him, waiting for him to sign, but not rushing him.

"What is this?" he said, though by that time he knew what it was.

"It's a vacation requisition," she said. She knew he knew.

"I know what it is. But why?"

"Well, Walter, she's taken one vacation day the entire time she's been with us, and she ended up back on the job half way through the day."

"We're in the middle of a case," he countered.

"There hasn't been one iota of progress on that case in over two weeks, and you know it. Besides, you've got Ferg, and we can bring over that loaner from Cumberland if we ask."

He pressed his fingertips to his temples, but then Ruby looked at him like she felt sorry for him, and he dropped his hands.

"All right I guess," he said, twisting his pen open.

He was about to sign when he noticed the number of days.

"Three weeks?" he almost yelled.

"She has seven saved up. And it's only eleven days.

"Eleven work days."

"It's her right as an employee of the County."

"Whose side are you on?"

It was an irrational thing to say. Obviously, there were no sides.

"Where's she going?" Walt asked.

"Walter, you should really talk to her yourself."

He studied Ruby's face, so gentle and so nurturing. Did she know what he'd done? Could she look at him like that if she did?

She reached across the desk and slid the form up so that the signature box was perfectly aligned with his right hand.

"It'll be all right," she said.

That was easy for her to say. She didn't know where his hands had been, where his mouth had been, where everything had gone so far off the established path, so far beyond control.

Now, out in this wilderness, Vic was going away for over two weeks, and there wasn't a damn thing he could do to stop her.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

**Late January**

_The next morning Vic seemed to be over it, and thanks to Ferg's ever increasing propensity for investigation, the Edwards case was moving forward._

_Dolores Edwards, the estranged wife, was not in Sacramento after all. She was in Gillette. _

_"__You're shittin' me," Vic said, sort of under her breath and to herself as she read through the background report. _

_Walt stood there, hands on hips, watching her drag it out, waiting. _

_Not so long ago, he would have just taken the report from her, or he would have gone back into his office and let her come to him if she had something to say about it. _

_Ferg seemed to sense the incongruity and threw Walt a bone: "She was a cafeteria worker for Durant Unified in the 80s and early 90s."_

_Walt nodded and shifted his weight while Vic flipped back to the top page and looked up at him with a grin._

_"__She was born in '64," she said. "Sixteen years younger than poor dead Warren." _

_She handed him the report, and said, "Gross." _

_Then, with her back to Ferg so it was just between them, she actually winked at him, and that wink pierced his chest like an excruciating cliché._

_After that, she went about her business._

_Of course he knew she was teasing him. The humor depended on him understanding that, and he did. It was a relatively harmless joke about this thing between them, and the reason she'd gotten so mad at him yesterday was what made it funny. _

_At least he thought it was. _

_The point, he reminded himself to counteract the wilting sensation in his masculinity, was that she didn't think it was gross at all. She only said it because really they both knew the truth was on the opposite end of the spectrum, and the key to this comic moment was that they both knew each other knew. _

_Still, it threw him. _

_It made him wonder what he was doing, and it made him think if he planned to keep doing it, he might as well do it right. _

_He just wasn't sure what doing it right would entail._

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late February**

It was early afternoon, a weekday, and the bar was empty.

Walt took the shot, put it down, and kept his fingers on the glass. He couldn't decide whether he wanted to sit down or not.

Henry was topping off the white plastic maraschino cherry and green olive containers from the tubs he kept in the walk-in.

"She's going on vacation," Walt said.

"And you have come to the conclusion that the world is ending."

"Don't be a prick, Henry. I'm opening up to you here."

"This is opening up?"

He wasn't going to beg. He slid the shot glass towards Henry and pushed away from the bar.

"Fine," Henry said. "Let's think about this. Does she have vacation time saved up?"

He stopped, but he didn't turn around, kept his back to Henry when he said, "Sure. Yes, a lot of it. We all do."

"And she has worked very hard during the time she has been with the Department?"

He stepped back to the bar, sat down, and propped his elbows on the counter, resting the heels of his hands in his eye sockets.

"You know she has," he grumbled.

"This, then, is a well-deserved break."

Walt removed his hands, and Henry tried to make eye contact, but he avoided it, looking instead over at the door to the office.

"You are afraid," Henry said, as he put the two garnish receptacles under the counter.

Walt didn't respond.

"You think she has given up on you and that she may not be returning."

He looked back at Henry.

"Maybe you should talk to her."

"And say what?"

Henry put two clean shot glasses on the counter and filled them. "I suggest talking to her about what happened."

"What do you know about what happened?" Walt said. Even to himself he sounded like a big growling baby.

"I am not as stupid as I look. And it happened here, did it not?"

Walt took the second shot, and this one burned his throat.

"I lost control, Henry."

"So you forced yourself on her?"

"Of course not."

"Then it was a consensual act."

Walt's skin was squirming. Technically it was a series of acts, but that was an entirely unnecessary clarification.

"I tried to talk to her about it," he said.

"When?"

"The day we got the autopsy results on Edwards."

"The autopsy that took ten days?"

"I already feel like crap. You don't have to rub it in."

"I had not even started rubbing it in. You waited nine days to bring it up?"

"We were busy," Walt said.

Of course, that had nothing to do with why he'd avoided it, and her, for a week and a half.

"Walter, I do not believe you are even remotely confused as to why Vic is taking a two week vacation."

"Eleven days."

"Whatever."

"No," Walt said standing up. "I guess I'm not."

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late January**

_He'd asked Ferg to go over to Gillette with him. That was before Vic had arrived, before he knew the little spat had run its course, but Ferg had begged off anyway. He was deep into the county real estate transactions involving Sawyer Assets. Interviewing some middle aged lady who had nothing to do with the homicide, if it even was a homicide, probably didn't sound all that appealing to him. So it was just the two of them again. _

_He was driving this time, left hand on the wheel, his right side open to her, offering her access if she wanted it. Despite his advanced age, he was capable of learning new tricks._

_The highway was a shimmery stream of run-off from the rapidly diminishing snow banks on the side of the road._

_"__Dolores Edwards, fifty years old," Vic said, perusing the report again. He shored up for another jab, but instead she said, "You know her?"_

_"__Me? Why?"_

_"__She's your age. Been here all her life, except for the time in California. There were like six people in your graduating class, weren't there?"_

_"__Closer to fifty."_

_"__So if she went to school here, you knew her."_

_He had already thought about it, accounted for the Doloreses of his own generation, and he'd only come up with two: one was about five years older, and she'd moved to New York City years ago to become a publishing executive. She was probably retired and living in a penthouse apartment overlooking Central Park. _

_The other Dolores had been in his class, and he'd known her well. One summer when she was thirteen or maybe fourteen, she'd gotten kicked in the head by her horse. She'd been beautiful. Henry had kissed her once, and Walt punched him for it. Now she lived in a group home in Sheridan. He saw her from time to time. She called him Wally, and she hadn't been married, and she never would be. _

_"__None I can think of," he said._

_"__I call bullshit. This is northern fucking Wyoming. Every fourth girl born in the 1960s was named Dolores."_

_"__In the '30s maybe. Every fourth girl in the '60s was Susan. Or Debra."_

_She snapped her fingers. "Dolly!"_

_He turned his head briefly to look at her, all bright-eyed and animated._

_"__You know any Dollys?"_

_He stretched his memory, and it took more effort than it should have. He was tired. _

_"__No Dollys."_

_"__Dotty?"_

_"__That's a diminutive of Dorothy."_

_"__Okay."_

_He loved her like this, squinting out the windshield across the fields and hills patched with white under unclouded blue sky, seeing nothing. Everything else was secondary when there was a puzzle to solve._

_"__Lola?" she said softly, trying it out. Then she turned to him and said, louder, "Lola. Or Lolita? Lolita! Like the book."_

_"__You've read that?"_

_Her surprise at his surprise surprised him. _

_"__Hasn't everybody?" _

_"__I don't think so," he said._

_"__It's sexy as hell."_

_"__It's about a child molester, Vic." His tone was disapproving, and it embarrassed him, like it made him some sort of prude, and that annoyed him._

_"__Is it?" she said. "I thought she was a teenager. It's been a while."_

_If they weren't already turning from the main drag of the Energy Capital of the Nation onto the much narrower pine-lined residential street, he'd have gotten to the bottom of it, asked her when she read it, sorted out whether or not they were talking about the same book, and determined how much her response bothered him if they were. _

_About two blocks up, Vic directed him to pull over in front of a well-maintained modular home with a plywood and two-by-four porch._

_He was opening the door to get out when she said, "Hey, Walt," and he stopped, turned towards her. _

_She licked her lips and looked down at her hands clasped in her lap. _

_"__You know I was kidding back at the office, right?"_

_He smiled and fought back the urge to reach out and touch her blushing cheek. "Yeah, Vic. I know."_

_"__I'm sorry I jumped all over your shit yesterday."_

_His vital organs swelled, and he was suddenly very awake, very aware._

_God, he just wanted to kiss her, but it seemed wiser to say, "I deserved it."_

_She smiled then and nodded, and kept her hands clasped in her lap and those warm brown eyes on him long enough that all the crossroads of his body started heating up with them._

_When they were out of the car, standing shoulder to shoulder, or shoulder to arm, facing the house before proceeding, he said, "I want you to jump all over my shit."_

_She looked up at him, thinking._

_There was nothing to figure out. He meant it pretty much exactly the way it sounded._


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

**Late March**

When she saw him, her face immediately turned cold.

Out here where she owed him nothing, the reverent, resilient workplace act was gone. He got out and walked across the gravel beneath the low-hanging overcast sky, so he was there when she opened the truck door. She didn't look at him as she gathered her things.

He expected her to acknowledge his presence, but when she didn't, he realized what an ignorant expectation it had been.

As she started down the front walk, she said, "Go home, Walt."

He followed her. "Vic," he said, but she ignored him.

At the door, she paused, and he thought she was giving in, but she put the key in the lock and she pushed the door open, and he was losing her. He reached out and took her arm as non-aggressively as he knew how, only lightly holding her around the elbow.

There was a strange stillness and silence, an eye of the storm freeze-frame, and then she was dropping her bags, one from the left shoulder and one from the left hand, and turning whip-quick like she'd been trained to do, her palms up and out, and with her whole body weight behind it plus inconceivable upper body strength for a person her size, she slammed her hands flat into his chest and shoved him back so hard it pushed the air out of his lungs and blocked the entrance, and he very nearly lost his balance. He stepped back two, then four, then six or maybe even seven steps, only his heels fully connecting with the walkway.

He was shocked, but not so shocked that he didn't hear the anguish when she said, controlled and hushed, "You have no right to touch me. Don't you dare touch me."

He was stunned and breathless, and her breaths were shaky, and there were tears in her eyes, and her face was red and damp. It reminded him of Aubrey Davis's parlor, how he'd yearned to have that effect on her. But not like this. He'd wanted it to be a dreamlike thing, and it had been, and he'd mistreated it.

For too long he'd existed within a network that tiptoed around his moods and his obsessions and his pain. He'd forgotten that the world doesn't really work that way. Martha hadn't put up with any of it, but with her gone he'd regressed. He didn't like to think of himself as a man who needed a woman to keep him in line, but maybe he was.

He showed her his hands, surrendering, like his next step would be sliding his sidearm across the stamped concrete to her, and if she wanted that, he'd do it. He'd do almost anything to get through this with her in his arms on the other side.

"Vic, I'm sorry."

There was a lump in his throat that he pictured as being his heart, but not really his heart with all its passage ways and vitality, but one of those manipulatively symbolic Valentine's hearts with its sharp edges.

"You need to leave," she said, and a tear broke free, dripping down her cheek. She didn't wipe it away.

He looked down at her right hand, half expecting it to be hovering over her weapon.

"Write the letter or don't," she said. "I don't care. A recommendation from some archaic sheriff in some backwards hick county won't mean much out there anyway."

She was trying to hurt him. He didn't allow himself to think about whether or not she meant it. That would be selfish. This wasn't about him.

Her bottom lip, the lip that he'd kissed and licked and that had bravely explored his body, trembled.

When she turned away from him again, he panicked, and he was moving on her before his brain even got the signal to act, or not to act. He wrapped his arms around her, holding hers tight down at her sides, his chest up against her slippery work jacket, his nose in her citrusy hair. She was like a heating pad turned up high.

She didn't struggle, just convulsed with soundless sobs, and his own lip began quivering.

"You fucked me and you threw me away like some bar whore," she said, her voice water-logged and worn-out.

He could deny it, but he wasn't sure what the point would be.

"You didn't tell me the rules ahead of time. You didn't warn me."

"There aren't any rules, Vic." He nuzzled his face into her hot neck, and she let him.

"You are so full of shit, Walt." Her tone was almost tender, almost submissive. "How the hell was I supposed to know you wouldn't respect me anymore?"

"It was me I couldn't respect, not you," he said.

"Then you're a selfish fucking asshole for taking it out on me."

"I know I am. I'll spend my life making it up to you."

"Please," she said dismissive and skeptical, her anger building again. "Let me go or I swear to God I'll break your fucking nose."

He knew she could, and she'd give herself a concussion in the process, so he let her go. She turned to him then, and the sight of her swollen eyes and red nose, and tear soaked cheeks made his heart ache, his real heart, the one in his chest.

She wiped her eyes with her fingers and her nose with the back of her hand. She was beautiful.

"Just let it go, Walt," she said. "I'll be gone within the month."

The tears he'd been holding back were spilling over now, and he wasn't ashamed, and he wasn't afraid of how it would make her see him.

"I can't let it go, Vic," he said, and he took her hand, and since she allowed that, he pushed it, and he leaned his forehead against hers.

"I love you, Vic. I can't remember not loving you."

"I don't love you," she said, but she didn't pull her head away, and tears started running down her face again.

"We'll be good together. I'm a good man when I've got a good woman."

"I don't love you."

"I love you, Vic."

"Well, I don't love you back."

"I don't believe you," he said.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

**Late January**

_Walt caught himself staring at the woman's breasts. _

_He'd never been one to ogle the female anatomy, at least not openly, but these were fascinating specimens of cosmetic artistry, not to mention rare in these parts. It wasn't that he was aroused by them. He didn't hunger to feel them in his hands or naked against his naked chest the way he frequently did with Vic's. It was, however, only natural to wonder how they would present unpacked from the tight, cropped V-neck sweater she was wearing. _

_When he managed to reroute his train of thought, he was somewhat relieved to find Vic similarly mesmerized by them. _

_"__Dolores Edwards?" he said, making direct eye contact because he was a professional. _

_"__I prefer Butler, but yes," the woman said. _

_Walt removed his hat and held it in front of him. "I'm Sheriff Longmire and this is Deputy Moretti from the Absaroka County Sheriff's Department." _

_"__I know who you are," she said. _

_"__You grew up in Durant?" _

_Her face wasn't familiar, but then again, it too had obviously been modified. _

_"__Lived nine months a year up in Helena with my grandparents. I spent summers in Durant."_

_She was unseasonably tan, and aside from her chest, rail thin. Though it was possible she suffered from some sort of spinal deformity, he was more inclined to think she was pushing her chest out on purpose. _

_The Campbell County Sheriff's Department was supposed to have done a notification earlier in the day, but something told Walt they hadn't gotten around to it._

_"__I'm afraid we have some bad news, Ms. Butler," Walt said. "May we come in?"_

_"__I suppose," she said. _

_Dolores Butler Edwards exhibited none of the various standard reactions citizens have at being informed by law enforcement that there is news and it's bad. She just let out a dramatic sigh, said, "Call me Lola," and ushered them in._

_Once Vic and Walt were settled in the bleak living room, she excused herself, presumably to deal with something in the kitchen that smelled like cabbage simmering in Budweiser._

_Vic shot him an astonished, wide-eyed glance, and mouthed, "Holy shit."_

_He wasn't sure if the bewilderment was in regards to the stoicism, the boobs, the aroma, or all three, but for some reason he almost laughed. He glared back at her, reprimanding her with his eyes for making him feel, and apparently act, like a sixteen-year-old. _

_"__So what's this all about?" Lola asked as she sashayed out of the kitchen, already bored with them._

_"__Uh, Lola," Walt said standing up. She was scanning the floor for something, and she didn't seem to be paying attention. He coughed and it refocused her. "We're sorry to have to inform you—"_

_"__He's dead?" she interrupted, and without waiting for a response, she fired off a high-pitched, "Woo-hoo!" and yelled, "Thank the Lord Almighty, Jesus Christ! Stella, we're free!"_

_"__Stella?" Walt asked._

_"__My sister. This is her house."_

_"__Is she home?" Vic asked._

_"__She's always home." She lowered her voice. "Bed ridden, poor thing."_

_"__You don't seem too broken up about it," Vic said._

_"__Eh, she's been a shut-in for years. It'll be a real pain in the ass getting her out of the house when she dies, but we do okay."_

_Vic gave him another quick look, but this time there was nothing funny about it._

_"__I think Deputy Moretti was referring to the death of your husband."_

_"__Oh, honey," Lola said, snapping her gum and picking up a leopard-print nail file from the 80s-era particle board coffee table. "I've been waiting for this day. You have no idea."_

_"__Do you know anyone who might have wanted to hurt Warren?" Walt asked. It was a question that could reasonably be categorized as stupid._

_Filing a French manicured middle finger, she said, "Ask me if I know anyone who didn't want to hurt Warren. That list is shorter."_

_"__Is that right?" Walt said. "Did you want to hurt him?"_

_"__Absolutely," she said._

_He put his hat back on._

_"__How long had you been separated?" Vic asked._

_"__About eight years, I guess."_

_"__That's a long time. Why didn't you get divorced?"_

_"__If I'd signed those papers, I would've had to pay alimony to that bastard." She was filing with more hostility now. "Alimony on my hair dresser's income when he's worth millions."_

_"__Millions?" Vic asked. "Really? Aubrey Davis seemed to think Warren was broke."_

_"__Well if you're considering Aubrey Davis a reliable source of information, I sure as hell hope I don't get murdered in your county."_

_Vic crossed her arms and tilted her head, but she kept whatever thought was swirling around in her mind to herself. It wasn't the oddest comment they'd heard in the past twenty-four hours, though no one had mentioned murder._

_"__Our reliable source believed your husband was having an affair," Vic said. _

_"__Was he really?" Lola said, and her mood seemed to lighten. "Well good for him. Who with? That little hottie down at the Pilot?"_

_"__He was under the impression it was with his wife," Walt said._

_Lola threw her head back and her chest out and guffawed. _

_"__Oh, Lord," she said. "Whatever floats your boat, I guess. Glad he got some before he made his exit."_

_Lola saw them to the door. _

_Once they were out on the porch, Walt turned to her. "One more thing, Lola. Are you seeing anyone?"_

_"__Why, Sheriff," she said, pouting her lips and batting her false lashes at him. "For a man like you, I've always been single."_

** [ ||||| ] **

**Later January**

Three days had passed, and twice already she'd tried.

Both times she'd touched him—once electric on his fingers and the other scorching on his back—and both times they'd been interrupted before she was able to say anything. He reacted to the interruptions not as intrusions but as rescues, and if he'd allowed himself to think about it, he would have hated himself for it.

She was so smart, so discerning about everything else, but for some reason, this she didn't notice.

It should have been awkward, and it was for him, but she didn't seem particularly uncomfortable. The way she looked at him had changed, though, and it made him feel like a liar.

It was warm, close to fifty degrees he guessed, and there were only a few remaining patches of snow in the shadowy places. The rest of the square was covered in dead, yellow grass.

He was opening the Bronco's door when he heard her call his name then saw her crossing the street towards him. Inside, little war machines discharged in all directions, ricocheting off the interior walls of his conscience. On the outside, though, he was calm, in control.

"Walt. Hey," she said, with that unusual self-conscious giggle he was only now associating with the moments that bordered intimacy.

"Vic," he said, backing up towards the driver's seat, away from her.

She moved closer, brought her hand up to the lowest button of his shirt, right above his belt, and she slipped one finger through the gap, so she was touching the skin of his stomach.

No one was around, he knew that. Still, he took her wrist between his thumb and forefinger, making minimal physical contact, and moved her hand deliberately down to her side and let go.

A recognition flashed across her features and was gone, but the innocent smile remained.

"I was thinking we could have dinner tonight," she said, tilting her head, her eyes dropping to his lips then back up to his eyes.

He couldn't breathe.

He cleared his throat. With a weak, twitchy smile he said, "I'm running out to Sioux Falls."

"For Yazzie?" she asked, confused.

"We got an address for him."

"Yeah, I know, but it hasn't even been ruled a homicide yet."

He rested his hand on the butt of his gun and allowed his vision to lose focus so that he appeared to be looking at her, but he wasn't really seeing her.

"Omar taking you?" she asked, her faith in him leaking out around the words.

She didn't assume she'd be going along with him the way she would have a week ago. This was the perceptive deputy he knew.

"Driving," he said.

"Isn't that like nine hours one way? What the fuck?"

She backed up now, almost all the way out of his personal space.

"What are you doing, Walt?" Her voice was airy and so quiet he had to fill in some gaps. But he figured it out; he knew what she'd said.

"Just moving forward with the investigation."

He believed it. He had to. There was no other way to live with himself.

She didn't say it was ridiculous, that he was ridiculous, though he was certain she was thinking it.

Once again she stepped back, this time so that she was completely outside the Bronco's doorway.

"Wow," she almost whispered.

She nodded and bowed her head, and when she lifted it again, she didn't try to meet his eyes.

He just stood there.

"Okay," she said, and only a very familiar ear could have perceived the small tremor.

Without any further attempt at communication, she turned around and walked back across the street.

As he got into the truck, he noticed a smoky smell on the balmy air.

Someone was burning trash.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late January**

_Vic didn't tease him about Lola's flirtations. _

_Once they were back on the four lane through town, she said, "Maybe Warren was the normal one."_

_"__We do seem to have people lining up left and right to get arrested for it."_

_"__If it's even murder."_

_"__Right," he said. "Think she did it? If it is?"_

_She was only half there with him, the other half was out in the snow-flecked evergreens behind the mom and pop stores lining the street. _

_"__I don't know. If Warren really was worth millions, maybe. If she stood to inherit, that is."_

_"__Or if her kids did."_

_The case was becoming more complicated, but all he could think as they pulled out onto the highway headed west back to Durant was that he was done with all the vacillating and the wavering. He was going to ask Vic out on a date, a real date, and he was going to do it today, and so that there was no confusion whatsoever, at the end of the date, when he took her home and said goodnight, he was going to kiss her. _

_"__Seems like a woman like her wouldn't go to all that trouble," Vic said. "There'd be easier approaches."_

_"__What do you mean a woman like her?"_

_"__Give me a break. You saw those tits."_

_He turned his head so she wouldn't see him smile. "I've seen better."_


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

**Early March**

It had been sixteen days since he'd seen her, and in that time, he'd had to punch a new hole in his belt.

He hadn't felt like going to the store, or cooking, or for that matter, showering, and he'd stopped going to the Red Pony because every time he did, Henry said something like, "How did Vic respond when you told her you are in love with her?" or "What kind of flowers did you give her when you begged for her forgiveness?" or "What cleaning products did you use to sanitize the office after you and Vic were finished in there?" or the final straw, "Tell me, Walter, how does it feel to be the biggest idiot in the Western Hemisphere?"

After that, he stayed home. There's only so much a man can take.

He wasn't hungry, so he drank a lot of beer, and he slept even more, and in the mornings he went to work, and when that was done in the evenings, he went home, and he still wasn't hungry, so he drank a lot, and thankfully, he slept a lot.

She returned to work on the second Monday morning in March suntanned and rested, and she had gifts for all of them. She gave Ruby a pair of mother of pearl earrings and Ferg a retro Hawaiian shirt. She gave Walt a refrigerator magnet in the shape of a bare foot. It said, Hang Ten Waikiki Beach.

He already knew she'd gone to Hawaii because Ferg and Ruby had refused to shut up about it. She'd texted pictures to Ferg, and emailed pictures to Ruby, and they'd both insisted on showing every single last one of them to Walt, for two weeks. A couple of times they were bikini shots. In one, a buff young guy had his arm around her, and Walt felt possessive, territorial because this gym rat was touching his woman. If he could have punched himself for the audacity of having such a thought, he would have.

He'd played it off, but each time he had to excuse himself to use the restroom, and once it was so bad he had to go home sick, and Ruby thought he must be dying, and he was.

But Vic was back now and she was okay. She was doing her job, and she didn't seem mad at him. She didn't seem anything she hadn't been previously, except she used to be his friend and now she wasn't. But she still talked to him sometimes when it wasn't a hundred percent necessary, so there was that.

He figured he'd just let it blow over, and maybe at some point it would feel normal again, and they'd revisit this thing between them, and the next time he'd do it right, and they'd look back at this and laugh.

In the meantime, she was still the best deputy he'd ever had.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late February**

After striking out with her the day the M.E.'s report arrived, he'd hung back to regroup.

It's possible he hung back a little too far for a little too long, but yesterday's conversation with Henry had knocked him upside the head and pointed him back in the right direction.

It was true: He was not unclear as to why she was taking time off.

The last day before her vacation started, she worked late tying up loose ends, and he stayed late because she was there.

When she was leaving, she called out to him from the main office to say goodbye, and he shot up to his feet, way too eager, and he banged his right knee hard on the underside of his desk.

She saw and probably heard him coming, so she waited.

Her hip was cocked and her arms were crossed and she was looking at him like she thought he was a moron but didn't want him to know she thought that.

He said, "Hey, Vic," and he ran his hand down over the back of his hair. "You think we could talk before you take off?"

"Sure," she said. "About what?"

He gestured for her to sit down.

"I'm comfortable talking standing up. Thanks."

He peered into his office as though planning an escape route, and he knew she was watching him, and he rubbed the back of his neck.

"Walt. Sometime this year."

The expression on her face reminded him of when he'd had to serve her the divorce papers. She was serious, and she was tough, and it scared him. He turned so he was facing her, shoulders square.

"About that night," he whispered. They were the only ones in the office, but it still seemed like a subject that warranted discretion.

Last time she'd acted like she had no clue what he was talking about, but she didn't do that now. She just waited.

"Go ahead," she said, shifting her weight then uncrossing and recrossing her arms. "I'm listening."

He shifted his weight, removed his hands from his hips then put them back. He scratched his head.

"I just think, Vic, there's been a misunderstanding, and I wanted to—"

"A misunderstanding?" she said, and it sounded like her jaw was clenched, and even in the low light, he could see the flush spreading up her neck and into her face.

"Yeah," he said. "I mean no. I think there's been some confusion about—"

"Confusion?" Her chest was rising and falling visibly now, her respiration rate increasing.

"Maybe confusion's the wrong word, but—"

"What do you want, Walt?" she said. Keeping her voice low and controlled was obviously taking some effort.

"I just want . . . ," he started, and then he lost steam, and he stammered a bit.

Then he just stared at her.

She must have counted to ten or something because there seemed to be a precise moment at which his time ran out.

"That's what I thought," she said as she walked away. "I'm glad we had this talk."

She closed the door behind her with emphasis a level or two below a slam. With that, her vacation began.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late January**

_When they arrived back at the station, Ferg met them in the lobby with cryptic eye signals and head nods, but no actual words._

_Walt tried for a moment or two to decipher what he was saying before he gave up. "Just speak, Ferg."_

_Ferg beckoned them both closer, now with hand signals, and Vic rolled her eyes. _

_He whispered, "Madelyn Davis is in your office waiting to talk to you."_

_"__So you think we need to draw our weapons before we go in there, Ferg?" Vic whispered sarcastically. _

_Ferg ignored her. _

_"__She says she knows who killed Edwards."_

_"__What the fuck is wrong with these people?" Vic said, looking at both of them like she expected an answer._

_Walt held up his hand and his deputies came to attention, for the most part. _

_"__Did you take a statement?" Walt asked._

_"__She wants to talk to you."_

_"__We can do that," Walt said. "She give you a name?"_

_Ferg turned his notepad to face them and pointed to the neatly handwritten name Dale Yazzie. Under it in parentheses was written, or Doug or Dave. _

_"__Yazzie?" Vic said. "How hard could that be to track down?"_

_"__It's the most common surname in the Cheyenne Nation," Walt said. "And if he's a member of the Nation, we don't have access to the records. So pretty hard."_


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

**Late January**

_Madelyn Davis renewed his faith in humanity. _

_She was cordial and appropriately sorry about Edwards' death, and she was also extraordinarily small, but that was irrelevant to the case and to humanity._

_Ruby got her a cup of coffee, and she sat on the couch in Walt's office with her stockinged ankles crossed and her ancient leather handbag perched on the lap of her tweed skirt. Her gray hair was pulled back into a loose bun, and Walt could see how she might have been pretty in her younger years, in an elfin sort of way. He could not imagine, however, her escaping across the properties to have depraved sex with Warren Edwards, or leaving Aubrey so the sex would be more convenient. _

_But, if it was even true, maybe she'd been in love. That he could understand._

_"__You mentioned to Deputy Ferguson that you know who killed Warren," Walt said._

_"__I just said, Sheriff, that if it turns out someone did kill Warren, you might want to look at Dale Yazzie. Could be Dave or Doug, but I think it's Dale. They had some humdingers out there at the ranch over the years."_

_"__Could you describe the . . . humdingers, Mrs. Davis?" Vic asked._

_"__Well, Dale—"_

_"__Or Doug or Dave," Ferg added, and Vic started to roll her eyes, but caught herself midway._

_"__He was Lola's sweetheart before Warren met her, but her folks didn't want her marrying an Indian. Warren knew her Pa from the men's poker league, and they came to some sort of arrangement, but the Indian kept comin' around, even after Warren and Lola were married. There were some nasty fights out there in the yard, but it didn't seem to stop Dale from comin'."_

_Mrs. Davis took a sip of her coffee._

_"__I just figured somebody ought to tell you," she said. "Those two Edwards boys sure don't favor each other."_

_"__Warren put up with that?" Walt asked, though he was only guessing at the implication._

_"__Warren thought about himself a lot."_

_Walt wasn't sure what that meant._

_"__You have any idea where we might find Yazzie?" Vic asked._

_"__I thought he lived on the reservation. But I betcha Lola would know. I don't doubt she kept up with him."_

_Walt walked Mrs. Davis out to her old Lincoln Town Car and opened the door for her. _

_"__I appreciate you taking the time to come by," Walt said once she was settled in the driver's seat. _

_"__My pleasure, Sheriff."_

_"__Just one more thing, Mrs. Davis. Can you tell me where Aubrey was Saturday night around midnight?"_

_"__Well, he was in bed with me. We both got up at around two to all that ruckus from the cows."_

_"__Thank you, Mrs. Davis," he said._

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late March**

The end was bittersweet.

They made the arrest at dawn, and the suspect had only just now been transported, late in the afternoon, under overcast sky.

When he came back into the office, Vic was still at her desk, in front of her computer, motionless. It was much darker inside than it had been out on the street.

As if she could read his thoughts, she reached over and switched on her desk lamp.

He'd asked her to finish up the paperwork, but it was getting late, and she'd been on this every waking hour for the past five days. At least he assumed she had been. He didn't know what she did when she left, but she hadn't been leaving for long, not even long enough to get a full night's sleep, and it looked as though she needed to punch a new hole in her belt, too.

Now when he thought about it, she'd been even more determined than usual to wrap up the case, especially once it really broke, once they got a match on the tire impressions.

He stopped in the middle of the office. When she didn't seem to notice him, he said, "Vic."

She didn't turn to him.

He stepped closer, the way one might sneak up on a rabbit, and he tilted his head to try to see her face, but she turned away from him, toward the window.

"Go get some rest, Vic," he said, and he recognized the sensitivity in his voice, the way he'd talked to her when his hand was under her shirt, his fingers spread out around her ribs, her brown eyes deep and communicative, telling him so much that he so quickly forgot.

She nodded, and when she did, the lamplight glanced off the wetness on her cheek, and there was a huge hand on his shrinking heart, squeezing. He moved closer, and then she did turn and she did look up at him, but only for a second, or probably less than a second because in situations like these, a second is a long time.

Her eyes were red-rimmed, and there were droplets in her thick eyelashes, and she had raccoon eyes from her make-up and lavender circles from her weariness, and he wanted to know if she was okay, but he knew she wasn't, and he didn't want to piss her off by asking, even though he was pretty sure it wouldn't piss her off if he asked, but he still couldn't do it.

So he went into the reading room, and he sat down on the toilet seat and he buried his head in his hands, and he willed himself to stop this, to be stronger, to help her.

When he came out, her laptop was closed, and her chair was pushed in, and her lamp was turned off.

And there was an envelope on his desk.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late January**

_He had Vic call Lola, who claimed not to have seen Dale—it was Dale—for a year and a half, and that she had no idea where he was. _

_"__You believe her?" Walt asked._

_"__About not seeing him, yeah. I'm not sure I believe she doesn't know where he is. She did say he grew up on the rez, and he's two years older than her."_

_"__Let's check for an arrest record."_

_"__Oh, and she said Dale didn't kill Warren."_

_"__How would she know that?" Walt asked._

_"__Unless she did it herself or she was with him that night, she wouldn't." She paused and tapped on the space bar of her laptop to bring it back to life, and he knew what she was going to say before she said it. "Sounds like she still loves him."_

_There were plenty of Dale Yazzies in the system, but none that had been born between 1960 and 1963, so they drove out to the Red Pony, and when they got there, Vic said, "Thank God. I'm starving."_

_"__He's not open. It's Monday."_

_But the door was open, so they went in._

_"__We are closed," Henry said from behind the bar, watching them approach over the top of his glasses._

_"__This'll only take a minute, Henry," Walt said._

_"__Why do I not believe you?"_

_"__You know a guy named Dale Yazzie?" Vic asked, leaning against the counter._

_"__Is this a joke?" Henry said. _

_"__About our age," Walt said. "We think he grew up on the rez. He didn't go to school with us, at least not under that name."_

_"__There are four or five Yazzie families living there now, but I do not recall a Dale."_

_"__We were wondering if you could do us a favor," Vic asked._

_"__Oh, really," Henry said, removing his glasses. "And what would that be?"_

_"__Can you get us in to go through the records so we don't have to deal with Mathias?"_

_"__You do understand that records for the 20__th__ Century are not digitized."_

_Walt nodded. "Yeah. We'll work fast."_

_Henry sighed. "Let me see what I can do. But I am leaving here at six for Deadwood whether or not your problem is resolved."_

_"__What's in Deadwood?" Walt asked._

_"__That is none of your business, unless it goes well."_


	9. Chapter 9

**Warning: **

**This ****one is super M-ish. I could probably get in trouble for disregarding the rating guidelines, but I'm going to risk it since I don't think there's any way it could result in criminal charges. If it's any comfort, I haven't specifically named any body parts below the belt. Aside from that, it's smutty, so save yourself while you can. **

* * *

Chapter 9

**Late January**

_It was just after midnight, in the middle of the fifth box, after the fourth round of drinks, when they came across the family file containing information on one Reynard D. Yazzie, born November 24, 1961. The father Dale Yazzie had been hit by a train in 1968 after passing out on the tracks, and later the same year, the mother had been hospitalized for a nervous condition. Soon after, Reynard was shipped off to a Bureau of Indian Affairs boarding school in Blue Cloud, Montana. _

_"__That's where they met," Vic said, suddenly alert after nearly five brain-numbing hours sifting through files in Henry's office._

_She pulled her phone out of her back pocket and started typing something with her thumbs. He returned the file he had in his lap to the fifth box and slid closer to her on the couch. _

_He'd had about twice as much to drink as she had. _

_"__See," she said, leaning towards him, so he could see the phone. "Saint Joseph Blue Cloud Industrial School, right outside Helena. Lola said she lived in Helena, right?"_

_Walt sat up straight, and took the phone from her, then he handed it back, and he leaned over to look at the file which was in her lap. He knew even then that he should have just taken it and slid back down the couch so their thighs weren't right up against each other. _

_"__That's him," he said. _

_It had been his idea that after each box, they go out into the empty bar for a drink. He'd served them, and the first two times they'd had a beer, but in reality, he'd had two, and the third time they'd had shots, two each, but he'd had another beer, too, and he'd brought it back into Henry's office with him, and she'd been responsible and reminded him of the promise they made to Henry that they wouldn't do anything to mess up the files. _

_Now his hand was on his left thigh so that the back of his fingers were against her thigh, and he moved them in what could be mistaken for a caress, like they had a mind of their own, which of course they didn't._

_Without looking up from the file, she said with what came across as caution, "Are you hitting on me, Walt?" _

_He turned his head, barely, and her face was so close he could actually see texture in her lips, and he said, "I was thinking about it," and this was the point at which he should have recited his invitation for dinner, asked her if she was free Friday because there was a great place up in Sheridan, and maybe they could get a drink first, and he'd pick her up, but he didn't because she moved a little closer and with one hand she held the file on her knees and with the other she put her phone down on the nearest box, and then she left the file open and she moved it carefully over to the top of one of the other boxes, and his pulse was thumping in his ears and he was already getting an erection. _

_He wasn't drunk, but he was a bit fuzzy around the edges, so when she said, "You went home and shaved," he said, "So did you."_

_"__How can you tell?" she asked in that flirty manner he was used to but usually didn't make him feel like he was going to come in his pants._

_"__I meant you got changed. And let your hair down," he said, trying to be serious, trying to pull them back from the fire, if only a few inches._

_"__And you're wearing a white shirt."_

_"__It's not white. It's off white."_

_"__Okay," she said, and her eyes dropped to his lips, and he didn't move._

_He was thinking about it, and he needed a little longer, but when she sat back, she turned and moved her right leg up onto the couch so she was sitting half Indian-style, and that was ironic, and politically incorrect at the same time, and it was the first time he thought he shouldn't have drunk so much. _

_She touched his hand where now it was touching her knee, and she said, "I'd be open to that."_

_And he said, "What?" _

_She whispered, "Do you think about it?"_

_And he said, "All the fucking time."_

_And she said, "Did you just say the F-word?"_

_And he said, "No. That wasn't me."_

_And she said, "You're sexy when you're drunk."_

_And he said, "I'm not drunk."_

_And she said, "Then you're just sexy."_

_And now her lips were so close they were like little puffy radiators, and he can't be sure, but he thinks it was him who made it happen, caused their lips to touch, but it was so light that he probably could have said it didn't really happen, I'm off the hook, but their bottom lips had stuck together ever so briefly, and that was evidence that it really did. _

_There was a two or three second break during which they were still safe. Nothing had happened, and he could have taken her hands in his and rattled off that stupid invitation, but he was afraid if he started rattling, it would stop what was happening, and he wasn't sure he wanted to stop in case it never got started back up again. _

_Then it started before he was ready, but beggars can't be choosers, and besides, he still thinks it was him that started it again, but this time, it wasn't just lips, it was tongues immediately, and it was like they had skipped a step because they had, or maybe it was more like the first step had been that stuck-lip thing and then they were onto the next level whether or not they had the first level down. Her lips were so spongy and her tongue was so soft and sweet and strangely hydrating, and it all worked so seamlessly and it worked like a sweeper, sweeping his mind clean, until some last accountable thought got through, and it poked him hard in the chest, and he pulled back, and her hand immediately went up to her lips, and she looked shocked and dazed simultaneously._

_He stood up and he took some deep breaths, the kind of deep breaths you're supposed to take into a bag so you don't freak out in public, or in private, and she said, "Oh my God," but it was muffled by her hand._

_And he said, "I'm sorry."_

_And she said, so calm and almost nurturing, "No. Don't say that, Walt."_

_And he said, "I meant to ask you out."_

_And she said, "The answer is yes. Now please. Come back."_

_She held her hand out to him, and he realized he had this massive boner in his jeans already that there's no way she couldn't see, and he couldn't believe the way it made his heart swell that she looked at it, he saw her look right at it, but she just looked back up at his eyes quickly and she said nothing about it. Nothing. _

_He wasn't sure what happened next. He dropped to his knees in front of her, and it's a low couch, so when he pulled her hips towards him, they ended up in exactly the right place, or the wrong place depending on which side of his personality was judging. _

_It was all a blur from there, his shirt untucked and unsnapped, and her sweater off and then her bra off, and his hands on her beautiful breasts and then her breasts against his chest just like he'd imagined, but so much better, and through it all, the kissing, the tongues, the humid heat._

_Then somehow her pants were off, and her underwear, and she was so ready, and he knew that because he'd checked, and she'd moaned when he did, so he'd checked for a while before he unbuckled his belt and pushed his pants and his boxers down just far enough for access because there wasn't time. _

_He was already part way in her when he said, "Wait."_

_And she said, "No. Come on. Oh, fuck." And she breathed and she squirmed. "Come on, Walt."_

_And he said, "I'm sure Henry has a condom," and he pulled back, but she grabbed his ass, and pulled him forward so now he was in deeper than he was before, maybe a couple of inches._

_She said, almost frantic, "No. No. I'm on the pill. I haven't had any sex since Sean left."_

_"__None?"_

_"__No. None. I swear. And he was faithful. I know he was."_

_"__I have."_

_"__What?"_

_"__Had sex," he said, and now she pulled back a little._

_"__Had sex?"_

_And he said, "No."_

_And he slid back in, to make up what they'd just lost, and God, she was so slick and so hot and so soft, and he said, "Yes. With Lizzie. With a condom," because his brain was scrambled, and as they had already established, he was a little drunk._

_She said, "Recently?"_

_And he said, "No."_

_And she said, "That once?"_

_"__Twice."_

_"__Twice?" _

_She pushed his hips back a little, maybe so she could see his face._

_And he said, "No. Yes, twice, but don't stop." He inched back to where he'd been. "It was the same night. Night and morning. With condoms."_

_And she groaned, "Oh, fuck, Walt."_

_And he buried his face into her neck, and kissed her there and said, "I'm trying, Vic."_

_And she laughed, and so did he, and he planted one hand on the edge of the couch, next to her incredible ass, and he wrapped one arm around her lower back and pulled her in towards him as he sank in all the way, and he almost came right that second, but he thought even if he had, it would have been all right because she loved him. _

_In that moment, that's what he thought._


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

**Early February**

She didn't come right out and say it, but she wouldn't ride with him anymore.

The day after they received the M.E.'s report, she fed him yet another excuse and ended up meeting him out at the Edwards place shortly before noon. He'd already been over to the barn and the house, and he was standing at the edge of the thawed stock pond when she pulled up.

"We need to get Aubrey out here," he told her.

If anything positive had come from his catastrophic mishandling of what could now only be labeled the one night stand, it was that she was more respectful of his authority and less mouthy.

"I'll go get him," she said.

Without even a hint of argument, she got back into her truck, and she drove off through the hazy mid-day sun towards the Davis property.

He was on the other side of the pond when ten minutes later she was back, and as the truck came down the decline into the bowl he could see Aubrey's worn brown hat peeking over the dashboard.

"How do, Sheriff?" Aubrey said when he was out and standing in the powdery new soil.

"Morning, Aubrey," Walt said, walking over to the spot where they'd dragged Warren out of the water. "Who filled this in?"

Aubrey looked down at his feet, kicked the dirt then glanced back at Walt. "I don't folla," he said.

"This area's been filled in. It was three or four inches lower the night Warren was found."

Aubrey scratched his beard and appeared genuinely perplexed.

"Where'd the cows go?" Walt asked, trying another angle.

"The renderer came and got 'em."

"How much did they pay?" Vic asked.

If he hadn't been offended by the suggestion ten days ago that he was dumb, he was certainly offended now.

"I paid fifty dollars per head for him to come get 'em, and that's after I whined and blubbered for a spell. That's three hundred fifty dollars for seven dead cows." He looked back at Walt, shaking his head. "How much they pay, she asks."

"Deputy Moretti's from the big city," Walt said. "She didn't mean any disrespect."

"Well she's here now, ain't she?"

Vic bowed her head and crossed her arms and stayed out of it.

"So no idea who filled this in?" Walt asked.

"Looks the same to me," Aubrey said.

"You know anything about Warren getting set to move?" Walt asked.

"Can't say as I do. But I hadn't been over there in at least a year. Doubt he woulda told me if he was. Maddie might know."

"Why might Maddie know?" Vic asked, but the question was void of any of her signature attitude.

"She'd been over a couple times. So what of it?" Aubrey said, getting a jump on defending himself.

"You were okay with her visiting Warren?" Walt asked.

"Now you hold on. It'd been a long time. Weren't nothin' goin' on with them now."

But Aubrey didn't seem so sure, and Walt felt bad for bringing it up.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late January**

_He woke up disoriented and thirsty with a low-level, creeping headache and an overhead light in his eyes. _

_It took him a moment to remember why he was lying on the couch in Henry's office with a woman's arm across his bare stomach and blond hair that smelled of lemon and lavender draped over his shoulder and chest._

_He tried to move her arm. He couldn't have been more careful, more gentle, but she stirred anyway, and fear scampered like spiders through his veins._

_She said, "Hey," and she lifted her arm from his stomach and ran her hand through his hair, and stretched to kiss his cheek, and he noticed his pants were unbuttoned and his boxers were riding low. _

_There was that stirring again, and he sat up. _

_"__I have to . . .," he started, and he almost said take a leak because apparently when the façade was stripped away, he was really just an ill-mannered Neanderthal._

_He went to the restroom and washed his face and ran wet fingers through his hair, and when he came back, she had a glass of water for him on the coffee table, and she'd moved the boxes out of the way, and she gave him a couple of Advil._

_"__You're not freaking out on me, are you?" she asked, playing with him, but the undercurrent was serious, warning even. "Dine and ditch?"_

_"__Dine and . . . what? No. Of course not," he said, and he put his arm around her because it was exactly what he wanted to do, and he wondered when the idea of doing what he wanted to do had gotten so screwed up in his mind._

_"__Good," she said. "'Cause I think we should do that again. Soon. And often."_

_She kissed him, and at first he didn't kiss her back, even though he wanted to, but then he did. _

_Then he was flat on his back on the couch and he was in her and warm all over, and she was running the show. She bent down and he kept moving and she said, "You may not have noticed, Walt," breathing hot and damp in his ear, "but I'm really into you," and there was a sun flare somewhere deep within him and he wanted to say something, but he didn't know what to say._

_His jeans and his underwear were bunched around his thighs for the second time in a matter of hours, and a voice came up at him from somewhere, scolding him, telling him the least he could have done was muster enough respect to take off his pants._

** [ ||||| ] **

**Early Febraury**

Walt found Reynard "You Can Call Me Dale, Sheriff" Yazzie working as the night watchman at a trucking yard just outside Sioux Falls.

His voice was deep and gentle, and his speech measured. "You drove six hundred miles to ask me where I was Saturday night?"

"I was out here on some business," Walt lied. "Thought I'd kill two birds."

Though Yazzie was two years older, he looked ten years younger than Walt. He was at least 6'4", probably more, with a buzz cut, and high cheekbones. Ruby would have described him as handsome.

"The night manager can verify I was here," Yazzie said, peaceful and accommodating. "He'll show you the video."

So Walt spoke with the night manager and he watched the video, then he thanked the manager, and Dale unlocked the gate and let him out.

As he was locking it up again, he said, "Sheriff," and he looked out over the dark trucking yard, and his Adam's apple bobbed in his throat. "How is Lola?"

"She seems good," Walt said through the rot iron fence. "She's living with her sister in Gillette."

Dale nodded like he knew that.

"When she left Warren," Walt said, "why didn't you two get back together?"

"We did, but I was stubborn. Been stubborn my whole life."

"You were up at Blue Cloud."

Dale nodded. "St. Joseph's. The Bureau schools do that to you. Tough's all you got. If I'd been weaker, I would've won."

Walt didn't get a motel after all. He drove through the night across the South Dakota Plains, up the slight incline over the Missouri near Pierre, past Wall Drug, and up into the Black Hills at sunrise, wishing he'd shown more restraint.

**Early April**

He was dozing off when he heard the truck pull up in front of the cabin.

The envelope, the blow-out at her front door, the tears had been over a week ago, and he hadn't been to the station since. He hadn't seen her.

If she still planned to go, Friday would be her last day.

He went out onto the porch in his socks and leaned against the support beam, and he watched her walk towards him with the evening sun glowing pink and yellow behind her.

She stopped at the bottom of the steps.

He stood up, bore his own weight, but he didn't rush her.

Finally she said, "To me, it was an incredible, romantic, beautiful thing, and it seemed like you felt it, too. It felt like . . . ."

"Love."

"It did, Walt. It didn't even occur to me it was wrong until you acted like it was." She bit her lip and crossed her arms, and she looked down at her boots, then out across the pasture, and eventually, she looked back up at him. "Who gets to decide what feels like love to me?"


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

**Late January**

_It was funny that he thought it wasn't like him to let her do the work, as though that were the critical behavior that contradicted all that he was supposed to be. _

_He wondered what kind of man did that. _

_She went through each box again, making sure it was neater than when they'd gotten it, and in order. On the fifth box, she spent time lying the documents out on the coffee table, and she took pictures of the whole file. She took pictures of pages they hadn't even looked at, and he thought it was funny, too, in the same anything-but-funny way, that he wasn't at all curious what was on those pages he hadn't seen._

_For a time he acted busy, sitting at Henry's desk over a map of Wyoming, but he wasn't really looking at it. He was wondering what kind of man did this, accepted this as a substitute for the courting tradition, which was a tradition for a reason, and what if he'd done this with Martha? That was a good point, and he filed it away because thinking on it too much would do things to him he didn't want done. _

_It wasn't that a man didn't do these things, it was that a man didn't do these things with a woman he intended to do right by later. And Walt didn't do these things anyway. It wasn't that he'd ever had to resist it. It had never come up. It had never occurred to him, which is probably why it hadn't even been part of the picture in his head of what he thought might happen if he drank a little too much, and maybe kissed her like he'd been aching to do. He wasn't going to lie: He'd known exactly what might happen if he drank too much. But he'd never even considered what really happened might happen. _

_There were two Walts in his head: one was this gangly, energetic, oblivious boy who didn't see what the big deal was, and the other was an adult, Sheriff Walt, with hints of his father and his grandfather and Coach Adams and even Lucian Connally, and that was a thought that sickened him because even Lucian Connally wouldn't have taken a good woman on a couch in someone else's office with his pants pulled half way down instead of taking her to dinner and bringing her flowers and winning her affection, not just the old fashioned way, but the right way. _

_His eye was on Douglas, where his cousin kept llamas and there was a Carrows down the block, when he thought no, Lucian wouldn't have done that with any woman he intended to court. Then he was right back to wondering what he'd done, full circle, because that's how these worry loops work, and he should know. He had experience with loops._

_When she was finished, she made a neat stack of the boxes by the door, and she looked over at him, watched him, and he pretended not to notice._

_She said, "You doing okay there, Walt?" like he was a little kid or an old man who had made a fool of himself._

_"__Yup," he said, and he pushed himself to a standing position, and his head still throbbed, and he didn't even put the Wyoming map back where he'd found it because really, within the scope of all this, what difference could that possibly make. _

_It was 5:30, and she wrapped her arms around his middle, so her now-covered breasts were against his stomach, and she said, into his off-white shirt, "You could come home with me for a while. We can get some sleep before we go in."_

_He put his arm around her, but she didn't even feel like her now, and he wanted to tell her how sorry he was, but he didn't want to open up that can. He especially didn't want to admit that he was freaking out on her like he said he wasn't when he already knew he was, because really, he didn't want to be the kind of man who'd do that._

** [ ||||| ] **

**Early February**

As impossible as it seemed with people so eager to incriminate themselves, they'd hit a dead end.

He'd called Ferg and Vic into his office to go over what they had, and Vic came in first. Though she didn't look at him, she didn't seem to be avoiding him, either.

Two days ago, after they'd gone over the autopsy, she'd put him in his place, made a point about being left alone in memory. But his mind was playing shell games with him, kept sliding him back over to the thought that maybe she really didn't remember, or worse, that it was an insignificant memory, and he couldn't imagine how that could be, especially since now in his own head it had crowded out almost any other idea or thought or feeling, which could be part of the reason they'd hit a dead end in the case.

When Ferg came in, he stayed standing, tapping the side of his leg with a pen and shifting his weight back and forth, unsure. Vic was writing something on a legal pad in her lap.

"Sit down, Ferg," Walt said. "Let's go through what we've got."

"Autopsy report," Vic said as soon as Ferg was settled. "We've got the manner of death, acute combined drug intoxication, plus secondary injuries to the body. Tire tracks leading to the pond's edge, but no match with the two Davis vehicles, Edwards' truck, or Lola's Mustang. We're still waiting on the results from Yazzie's tread."

For the first time that morning, she made eye contact with him, and it spread goosebumps up his arms. He hadn't gotten tire impressions from Yazzie's vehicle, and she knew that.

"Fill dirt over the tire tracks," he added, mostly to move on.

"So the killer doesn't understand forensics," Vic said.

"We said that about something else." Accessing mental details had become an exercise in bushwhacking.

"The postmortem ligature marks," Vic said.

"Right."

"The killer has access to the land."

"Pretty easy to hire someone to bring in dirt," Ferg said. "None of the gates were closed either time I went over."

"They all had motive," Vic said.

"Anything new on the land?" Walt asked Ferg.

"Just what I told you. Sawyer doesn't own any of the land Aubrey claimed it did. The eight surrounding parcels bought up in the past five years were purchased by six different land acquisition companies."

"All of them companies? No individual buyers?" Walt asked.

"I don't think so," Ferg said. "I can check."

"And see what you can find out about those companies."

"Alibis," Vic said, flipping the page on her legal pad. "Aubrey has his wife, Lola her sister, and Yazzie, his job."

"So two of the three don't hold water. One's a spouse, and the sister wouldn't necessarily know if Lola stepped out in the night."

"And Yazzie could've left work after his shift, taken a quick trip out here, and turned right back around after. We have proof that can be done."

Ferg turned to her with a baffled half-smile, and she grinned.

"Noted," Walt said.

Not two weeks earlier he'd thought if he could change anything, go back and regroup and do it right, he would have drunk less and kept his hands and his mouth and his body to himself.

That's not what he thought now, despite what it said about him. That's not the part he would do over.

He needed to get this solved. He needed to focus, take some action, anything to get out of the holding pattern.

And he was already pretty tired of the Edwards case, too.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late January**

_Henry showed up at seven._

_"__What are you still doing here?"_

_"__Just stayed to help you load the boxes."_

_"__There are six of them," Henry said, squinting, studying Walt's face. _

_Walt picked up two boxes and started across the bar._

_"__Did you find what you were looking for?" Henry called after him._

_"__Yup."_

_"__Did Vic help you?"_

_Walt readjusted the load so he could open the door._

_"__Yup," he said._

_When Walt came back in, Henry blocked his path._

_"__Walt, what is wrong?"_

_"__Nothing. Just need to get some sleep."_

_He started to move again, to go around, but Henry moved, too._

_"__Are you ill?"_

_"__No, Henry. Come on. Let's just finish this up."_

_When he started walking again, Henry grabbed him, and Walt jerked his arm away. Rage boiled in his gut, and he was ashamed of that, and of everything._

_"__Walter, I do not need to know what you are overthinking to know that it is in the past."_

_Walt nodded. "I just need to get some sleep."_


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

**Mid-March**

Ferg made the first major crack in the case three days after Vic returned.

"See?" Ferg said, pointing to the Absaroka County parcel map on his laptop. "These five parcels were purchased over a four year period by five different companies. Various U.S. addresses, all P.O. boxes. There are three more on the Cumberland side with two additional buyers."

"Okay," Vic said. "So?"

She shifted her position for a better view, stepping on Walt's left boot in the process, then lost her balance. On reflex, he grabbed her around the waist to steady her. She looked at him wild-eyed, frightened even, and he let go. She didn't move away from him, but she was breathing hard and holding onto the back of Ferg's chair with both hands as if still trying to stabilize.

"All six of these companies are subsidiaries of the same parent company." Ferg clicked a tab at the top of the screen and a primitive-looking webpage came up. "Ace Holdings. See all these links? They're dead." He clicked on two and nothing happened. "No address, no phone number, no identifying information except the name of the company, pictures of ranch and farm land, and this meaningless crap down here."

"Get to the point, Ferg," Walt said because he was uncomfortable, and his pants felt tight.

Ferg switched to another tab. "You know Google Earth, right?"

Vic said, "No," which judging by her tone meant yes, at the same time Walt said, "Yes," which meant he'd heard of it.

"This is the Ace Holdings Corporate Office."

"It's a corn field," they both said.

"Yup. In Colby, Kansas."

"The owner?" Vic asked.

"Cornelius Westmoreland."

"Sounds like one of the Knights of the Round Table."

"Got any contact information?" Walt asked.

"Sheriff, Cornelius Westmoreland was Warren Edwards."

"Shut the fuck up," Vic said.

"One of the subsidiary companies was in the process of buying the Edwards property when he died."

"So Edwards was buying property from Edwards?" Walt said.

"Basically."

"How much is all that land worth?" Walt asked.

"According to Zillow, about eighteen million."

"Lola was right," Vic said.

Over the next few days, they focused on Lola and her bank accounts. The conclusion they ultimately came to was that she had known there was money, but not how much or where, and she certainly hadn't benefited from any of it. Not a penny had been left to her or the sons, who were in town, and in spite of what Maddie Davis had implied, obviously shared DNA on both sides.

The second major break in the case came a few days later, also thanks to Ferg. He'd been reviewing the crime scene photos when he came across something they'd missed.

He showed them an enlarged photo of the Davis property, focused on the outbuildings off to the side of the house.

"What do you see in that space at the bottom on this one over here?" Ferg said.

Vic moved to Ferg's side and leaned into the screen. "Tires? A bumper?"

"That's a third vehicle. Aubrey said they had the two: his work truck and Maddie's Lincoln. That's neither."

Still bent over the desk, Vic said, "Enough for a warrant?"

"Do the affidavit," Walt said. "Let's find out."

The following evening all three of them descended on the Davis property, a warrant for the one outbuilding in hand.

There were thunderheads above and a cold wind building as they followed the path from the dooryard to the barns. Aubrey scurried along next to them.

"Sheriff," he said, his gravelly voice an octave higher than usual, "I don't understand what you're lookin' for. I ain't hidin' nothin'. If I'da ended Warren, I'd own it."

"Why didn't you tell us about the truck, Aubrey?" Walt said, loud and gruff.

"That ol' thing don't run. Why would I mention a truck that don't run?"

Aubrey crouched to unlock the metal door, and rolled it clattering up.

Inside was an old Apache pick-up on a jack, faded orange and missing the left rear wheel.

"It don't even have all four tires, Walt," Aubrey said as he reached with shaking fingers into the pocket of his frayed, checkered shirt. He pulled out a pouch of tobacco and a packet of papers.

"Fourth tire's back here," Vic called from a doorway at the rear of the garage.

Ferg rolled it out into the yard just as the first fat raindrops soaked into the dry dirt.

"We'll get this back to you in a couple of days, Mr. Davis," he said.

They did return as promised in a couple of days, this time at dawn with a warrant for the whole property and evidence bags. The tire had been a match.

They seized a branding iron from the barn and a used condom and two camping mats from the bed of the Apache as well as a laptop from the kitchen and a bag of unmarked pills Vic found hidden inside the sewing machine console.

When Walt returned to the parlor, Aubrey had his face in his hands as Maddie patted his back, and cooed, "I know, Pet. I know."

Walt cleared his throat.

"Aubrey," he said, "I'm going to need you to stand up."

Aubrey rose on unsteady legs, and when he did, Walt removed the handcuffs from his belt. He reached out then and took Maddie's hand like he was asking her to dance.

"Madelyn Davis, you are under arrest for the murder of Warren Edwards."

Her head shot up, her eyes curiously dry and furious. "What are you talking about, Sheriff?"

Aubrey swayed, and fell to his knees. Vic ran over to him.

"Warren had promised to take you with him, Maddie, hadn't he?" Walt said. "But when the time came, he changed his mind."

"It ain't true," Aubrey said from the floor between sobs. "I killed him myself. Held his head down in the pond."

"I'm sorry, Aubrey," Walt said. "I am. Maddie can tell you Warren didn't drown. She went out to help him, spend one last evening with him." He faced Maddie again but she kept her head down and said nothing else.

"The house was a mess with boxes, so you lay with him in the back of the truck, parked in his barn. The tread matches there, too. You two drank quite a bit of wine, saying goodbye as you were. And then you drugged him. You'd seen the cows in the stock pond on the way over that night, and you changed your plan. All you had to do was pull to the edge of the pond and push him out, make it look like an accident, like he'd been out trying to save the cows."

"Maddie, no," Aubrey cried. "No."

She looked away from her husband as Walt secured the cuffs, then Vic walked her out to the Bronco.

** [ ||||| ] **

**Early April**

She sat on one side of the steps, and he sat on the other. The sun was reddening above the dark horizon, and the air smelled of blossoms.

He was careful not to make any sudden movements.

"Tell me what you want, Walt," she said.

"You." He didn't have to think about it. "Us."

She was leaning, elbows on knees, gazing out over the pasture, and she nodded.

"And I want you to forgive me, Vic, but I don't see how you ever could."

She sat up and turned to him.

"See, Walt, that's it right there. Whose standards are these? Who's making the rules? 'Cause seriously, what you did hurt. It hurt like hell. But I wasn't not forgiving you because the offense was so unforgivable. I wasn't forgiving because you weren't asking me to. I wasn't over it because I needed to know you knew how you'd hurt me, and you were acting like you didn't."

"I abandoned you."

"That's what it felt like."

Her lips were parted, and she was facing out again, away from the cabin and into the evening, and a ray of sunset shone off the inside of her bottom lip, and he wanted to kiss her, but he wanted to wait because he wanted her to want it, too.

"But you know what else, Walt? If I didn't think there was a good chance you'd react that way to half-dressed, spontaneous animal sex, I haven't been paying attention. And if you thought I wanted to be courted the old fashioned way, neither have you."

"I liked the sex," he said, and it seemed inappropriate, but he didn't care.

"Yeah. I thought you did."

"I was conflicted."

"But you're past that now?"

"If you don't believe me, I can show you."

She slid across the wooden step and took his hand. Hers was so small and so warm and so strong, and she stretched up to kiss him, slow and lingering.

He put his arm around her waist and pulled her closer.

"I would never hurt you on purpose, Vic."

"I know you wouldn't. That's why I'm here. But not meaning to doesn't get you off the hook when you do."

"Understood."

"I'm not willing to be a symbol of your honor, Walt. Your honor's your own problem."

"Does that mean you'd be willing to try again?"

"Which part?"

"All of it."

"Can I have my job back?"

"Yes. On one small condition."

"Uh-oh."

"Tell me you love me."

She stood up on the lower step and faced him, moving in close between his knees with the sun now setting behind the hills, behind her.

She hugged him, and she whispered, "I love you, Walt."

** [ ||||| ] **

**Late May**

She came in smelling like summer with beads of sweat on her upper lip. He was at his desk reviewing resumes, and she turned his chair towards her, hands on the armrests, and kissed him, salty and deep.

"Where is everybody?" she asked.

"Ruby's at lunch." He reached around and grabbed her ass. "And Ferg's on patrol."

"And dufus?"

"Gary is on a lost dog call."

"I thought we weren't doing those anymore."

"We aren't."

She ran her finger from his bottom lip, down his stubbled chin, over his collarbone to his sternum, and unsnapped the top button on his shirt. He grabbed her wrist.

"You're hurting me," she said, nipping his ear.

"Good."

"I think we need to return Gary," she said into his neck with her hand sliding up his thigh.

"Then help me find someone better," he said, his breath hitching when she reached his crotch.

The downstairs door slammed, and she jumped back, wiping her mouth.

She was at her desk when Ferg came in.

"Stoners in the park," Ferg said.

"Oh, right," Vic said, getting up again. "I forgot to mention, Walt, those burnouts are out there knocking back forties and smoking bud."

"What?" he said.

"Those unsavory young men are in the square consuming alcoholic beverages and smoking marijuana."

"Again?"

"Apparently."

"Who spends their life like that?"

He pushed back from his desk and grabbed his hat from the rack.

As he was on his way out the door, she said, "They do."

* * *

**Complete**

**Thanks for reading and for all the reviews and PMs. I apologize for any undue anxiety the story caused, but it's all good in the end. : )**


End file.
